About

Jennifer C. Drew is a genomics lecturer and STEP program professor in the Department of Microbiology & Cell Science at the University of Florida. Her role involves teaching and mentoring students in the field of genomics, contributing to the department's educational and research missions.

Research topics

• Biology
• Medicine
• Computer Science
• Sociology
• Genetics
• Psychology
• Engineering ethics
• Mathematics education
• Physics
• Knowledge management
• Medical education
• Engineering
• Immunology
• Environmental health
• Data science

Selected publications

• Revisiting barriers to implementation of bioinformatics into life sciences education

  Frontiers in Education · 2023-11-30 · 7 citations

  articleOpen access1st author

  Introduction Bioinformatics is an interdisciplinary field at the intersection of computational and biological sciences that focuses on the analysis and interpretation of large biological data sets. Although recognized as essential in the life sciences, bioinformatics is not commonly integrated in undergraduate life science education programs. Based on a national survey in 2016, the Network for Integrating Bioinformatics into Life Sciences Education (NIBLSE) published a community-sourced set of core competencies in bioinformatics education. The survey also identified barriers that prevent incorporation of these competencies into the curriculum. In the current study, the NIBLSE group reports the findings of a new survey to 509 life science educators across the US in 2022 to identify current barriers of bioinformatics integration and to determine if the landscape of bioinformatics education has changed since the 2016 survey. Results Similar to previous results, a majority of respondents who currently teach bioinformatics or plan to teach bioinformatics report barriers. The top two barriers reported are students lacking prerequisite skills/knowledge and instructors lacking time to restructure course content. As in 2016, women reported experiencing barriers to bioinformatics teaching significantly more often than men; faculty from underrepresented minority backgrounds reported barriers more often than non-URM faculty; and educators at minority-serving institutions (MSIs) reported barriers more frequently than colleagues at non-MSIs. For additional insight into the barriers facing these educators, we conducted focus groups which provided qualitative data that supported the survey findings and revealed common themes including faculty perceptions of the relevance of bioinformatics in the curriculum. Despite the perceived value of bioinformatics education, many focus group members cited lack of student preparation and interest, and technological access as barriers. Participants also discussed how professional development and community support would enhance and sustain bioinformatics teaching. Discussion Taken all together, this study indicates that challenges remain, which vary among faculty types and settings, but that more educators are attempting to integrate bioinformatics into life sciences education. In summary, our results suggest that redoubled efforts to provide training and community support to life sciences faculty is necessary.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Online and on-campus transfer students experienced different impacts from the pandemic

  Frontiers in Education · 2023-02-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  The COVID-19 pandemic caused extensive disruption to higher education, highlighting the negative impacts of emergency shift to online instruction. As a result, advantages of intentionally designed, online programs in higher education were overshadowed during the pandemic. Furthermore, socioeconomic disparities were exacerbated during the pandemic which extended to STEM undergraduate transfer students, who are more likely to be low-income, from historically underrepresented groups, older, and first generation in their family to attend college. To better understand the impact of the pandemic on STEM undergraduates, including those in an intentionally designed online program, ordinal regression analysis of 352 student survey respondents enrolled in a life sciences major at a large, R1 institution in the United States spring 2020 through fall 2021 was performed. Three student types are compared: on-campus, first-time in college (FTIC); on-campus transfer (OC-TR); and online transfer (ONL-TR) students. The latter group receives all course delivery online, whereas on-campus student groups received predominately in-person course delivery prior to the pandemic. ONL-TR students were over six times less likely to report negative educational impact compared to on-campus students, FTIC and OC-TR, while controlling for parent education, income, gender, race/ethnicity, and GPA. Additional survey items further explored this result and were validated with academic records and thematic analysis of students’ text responses. A pre−/post-pandemic comparison revealed that students maintained a similar course load and GPA, despite increased perceptions of a lower GPA during the pandemic. OC-TR students were over two times more likely to express increased concern related to delayed graduation and higher frequency of feeling stress compared to FTIC and ONL-TR students. Meanwhile, low-income students were more likely to report stressors due to the pandemic’s impact on daily life, independent of student type. Taken together, students in this intentionally designed online program were more resilient to the educational and emotional impacts of the pandemic compared to on-campus students. The differences between student groups warn against generalization of student impacts and suggest further research into the positive role of online learning, not just for delivery of educational content and expanding access, but for academic and emotional stability for different student populations.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Making Change Sustainable: Network for Integrating Bioinformatics into Life Sciences Education (NIBLSE) Meeting Review

  CourseSource · 2022 · 5 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Computer Science
  • Knowledge management

  The purpose of the meeting described in this review was to decide how best to ensure the sustainability of the <a href="https://qubeshub.org/community/groups/niblse">Network for Integrating Bioinformatics into Life Science Education</a> (NIBLSE; pronounced &ldquo;nibbles&rdquo;). Biology research today generates large and complex datasets, and the analysis of these datasets is becoming increasingly critical to progress in the field. The long-term goal of NIBLSE is to address this need and achieve the full integration of bioinformatics into undergraduate life sciences education. Meeting participants supported several next steps for NIBLSE, including further development and dissemination of bioinformatics learning resources through our novel incubators and Faculty Mentoring Networks, vigorously pursuing assessment strategies for our learning resources, connecting learning resources with open educational resource (OER) textbooks, learning more about barriers to bioinformatics implementation for underrepresented groups, and developing future workshops and meetings. About half the participants at the meeting were newcomers to NIBLSE, a positive sign for the future. NIBLSE has many exciting opportunities available, and we welcome life science educators with any level of bioinformatics expertise as new members.

  PublisherDOI

• Saliva microbiome, dietary, and genetic markers are associated with suicidal ideation in university students

  Scientific Reports · 2022 · 35 citations

  • Genetics
  • Immunology
  • Biology

  Here, salivary microbiota and major histocompatibility complex (MHC) human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles were compared between 47 (12.6%) young adults with recent suicidal ideation (SI) and 325 (87.4%) controls without recent SI. Several bacterial taxa were correlated with SI after controlling for sleep issues, diet, and genetics. Four MHC class II alleles were protective for SI including DRB1*04, which was absent in every subject with SI while present in 21.7% of controls. Increased incidence of SI was observed with four other MHC class II alleles and two MHC class I alleles. Associations between these HLA alleles and salivary bacteria were also identified. Furthermore, rs10437629, previously associated with attempted suicide, was correlated here with SI and the absence of Alloprevotella rava, a producer of an organic acid known to promote brain energy homeostasis. Hence, microbial-genetic associations may be important players in the diathesis-stress model for suicidal behaviors.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• What is a vaccine?

  EDIS · 2022-06-10

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  This publication discusses the purpose of a vaccine, clarifies a few important definitions, and describes the types of vaccines currently available. Written by Melissa K. Jones, Meghan A. Berryman, Kelley Lobean McKinley, and Jennifer C. Drew, and published by the UF/IFAS Department of Microbiology and Cell Science, May 2022.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Common Vaccine Myths

  EDIS · 2022-03-07

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  In this publication, five of the most common vaccine myths are discussed and dispelled. Written by Kelley Lobean McKinley, Meghan A. Berryman, Melissa K. Jones, and Jennifer C. Drew, and published by the UF/IFAS Department of Microbiology and Cell Science, March 2022.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The Need for Equitable Scholarship Criteria for Part-Time Students

  Innovative Higher Education · 2021-04-19 · 5 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract Current policies and interventions to enhance student success and retention are often tied to full-time enrollment, which are substantiated by studies associating part-time enrollment with lower retention and poorer academic outcomes. However, these findings are limited to studies of first-time college students and do not represent today’s nontraditional undergraduate who may be transfer, online, and working adult students. To enhance retention of on-campus and hybrid online 2 + 2 transfer students in a STEM undergraduate program, need-based scholarships are awarded to students enrolled full-time as stipulated by the federal granting agency. Although the scholarship has helped &gt;80 students to date, over 40% of eligible transfer students are excluded only because they are enrolled part-time, disproportionately affecting students in the hybrid online track who are more likely to be women and underrepresented minorities. Using quantitative and qualitative methods, this study explores enrollment behavior of transfer students (online and on-campus), its relationship with student characteristics and academic outcomes, and implications for scholarship eligibility. Full-time enrollment is a significant challenge for transfer students. While scholarship requirements are a key factor influencing full-time enrollment, online transfer students additionally cite work and family obligations as drivers of enrollment behavior. Thus, online 2 + 2 transfer students face different challenges than on-campus peers and are more likely to enroll part-time out of necessity, yet still have comparable GPA and graduation rates. These findings support a growing awareness of barriers nontraditional students face questioning the relevance of policies driven by “traditional” student outcomes, which perpetuate inequity in higher education.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• There Is More than Multiple Choice: Crowd-Sourced Assessment Tips for Online, Hybrid, and Face-to-Face Environments

  Journal of Microbiology and Biology Education · 2021-09-30 · 6 citations

  articleOpen access1st author

  Developing effective assessments of student learning is a challenging task for faculty and even more difficult for those in emerging disciplines that lack readily available resources and standards. With the power of technology-enhanced education and accessible digital learning platforms, instructors are also looking for assessments that work in an online format. This article will be useful for all teachers, but especially for entry-level instructors, in addition to more mature instructors who are looking to become more well versed in assessment, who seek a succinct summary of assessment types to springboard the integration of new forms of assessment of student learning into their courses. In this paper, ten assessment types, all appropriate for face-to-face, blended, and online modalities, are discussed. The assessments are mapped to a set of bioinformatics core competencies with examples of how they have been used to assess student learning. Although bioinformatics is used as the focus of the assessment types, the question types are relevant to many disciplines.

  PublisherDOI

• Online and in-Person Delivery of Upper Division Lecture Courses in Undergraduate Life Sciences Degree Programs Leads to Equivalent Post-Graduate Degree Outcomes

  Journal for STEM Education Research · 2020 · 4 citations

  • Sociology
  • Medical education
  • Mathematics education

  Abstract Although many studies demonstrate that online education is as good as face-to-face education with regard to learning gains, course grades, and other near-term metrics, there is a major gap in exploring the long-term outcomes of online vs. face-to-face education, particularly in STEM programs. In this study, the effect of course delivery method on the long-term academic success of B.S. graduates was tested by comparing two similar life sciences undergraduate programs at the University of Florida. The Microbiology and Cell Science program teaches all upper division lecture courses online while the Biology program teaches nearly all of its upper division courses face-to-face. Graduate degree outcomes of 4978 students who completed their B.S. degree from either program (2011–2018) were determined using StudentTracker from the National Student Clearinghouse. The percentage of graduates with any doctoral degree (M.D., D.O., Ph.D., or other) did not differ. However, a significantly higher percentage of Microbiology and Cell Science graduates completed a Ph.D. or master’s degree compared to Biology graduates. Thus, online delivery of upper division undergraduate courses had no adverse effect on the future academic success of these students.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• <scp>pime</scp> : A package for discovery of novel differences among microbial communities

  Molecular Ecology Resources · 2019-11-07 · 43 citations

  articleOpen access

  The data used for profiling microbial communities is usually sparse with some microbes having high abundance in a few samples and being nearly absent in others. However, current bioinformatics tools able to deal with this sparsity are lacking. pime (Prevalence Interval for Microbiome Evaluation) was designed to remove those taxa that may be high in relative abundance in just a few samples but have a low prevalence overall. The reliability and robustness of pime were compared against existing methods and tested using 16S rRNA independent data sets. pime filters microbial taxa not shared in a per treatment prevalence interval started at 5% prevalence with increasing increments of 5% at each filtering step. For each prevalence interval, hundreds of decision trees were calculated to predict the likelihood of detecting differences in treatments. The best prevalence-filtered data set was user-selected by choosing the prevalence interval that kept a large portion of the 16S rRNA sequences in the data set while also showing the lowest error rate. To obtain the likelihood of introducing type I error while building prevalence-filtered data sets, an error detection step based was also included. A pime reanalysis of published data sets uncovered other expected microbial associations than previously reported, which may be masked when only relative abundance was considered.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Florida Pathways to Success: A Research University/Minority-Serving Community College Partnership to Enhance Retention and Diversity of Transfer Students

  NSF · $4.8M · 2017–2024

Frequent coauthors

• Eric W. Triplett

  University of Florida

  38 shared

• Mikael Knip

  Tampere University

  17 shared

• Olli Simell

  13 shared

• Mark A. Atkinson

  University of Florida

  11 shared

• Jorma Ilonen

  11 shared

• Sebastian Galindo‐Gonzalez

  University of Florida

  11 shared

• Alexandria N. Ardissone

  University of Florida

  10 shared

• Mark Pauley

  U.S. National Science Foundation

  10 shared